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Hey, Mom and Dad! Has School Told You About Recruiter Opt Out?

Since the No Child Left Behind Act was passed, schools in America have been required to give students’ personal information to military recruiters unless a student’s parents specifically state otherwise. In matters of consumer information congressional majorities have declared that adults must have privacy by default, opting in to any credit or information-sharing program. When it comes to military databases, however, parents have to take action to opt their kids out. Under the same Act, schools are legally required to notify parents they can opt their children out, but some schools have decided to do so only nominally, posting notice on the internet and leaving it at that. When parents are forced to actively find notice that they can opt out of having their kids’ personal information go to the military, that makes the likelihood of non-disclosure doubly doubtful.

Leave My Child Alone has implemented an ongoing effort to coax schools into actively including an opt-out form as part of the yearly emergency contact form parents receive in the mail. Peace Action New York and the Committee Opposed to Militarism and the Draft provide materials educating peace activists about their legal right to provide information in schools wherever military recruiters are offered the same access (New York peace activists had to go to court to affirm that right).

On a personal level, Mom and Dad, remember that you have to opt your kids out every year in order to avoid the onslaught of military recruiters’ calls and visits. Now’s the time to fill out those forms if you’re so inclined. For parents who cannot find their school’s opt-out form, the American Friends Service Committee offers their own printable opt-out form for parents to submit.

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About the authorJim Cook

I haven't been everywhere, but I've lived lots of places in the USA: the North, the South, the East, the West, and places in between. Every place I've been, I've seen acts large and small of kindness, callousness and disregard. Here we are. What will we do?

7 thoughts on“Hey, Mom and Dad! Has School Told You About Recruiter Opt Out?”

Damn!!! Thanks for the reminder. There is soo much that needs to be gotten “back to normal” after the complacency of the electorate during the non-Democratic control of our legislative process, justice departments and government agencies. America has moved so far to the “right” that a main stream Democrat is more “progressive” than the “progressives” were 2ish years ago. Back in “the day”, progressives were IN THE STREETS demanding change. Maybe it’s time to revive the old timey “political” music festivals.

Reasonable would be to “opt-in” to the military stuff.

FYI, my legislators know me by my first name, I have contacted them so often.

It is a time of fear in the face of freedom, a time of an emptying country and swelling cities, a time for the widening of previous roads and the opening of new paths, yet a time when these paths are mined by knowing algorithms of the all-seeing eye. It is the time of the warrior's peace and the miser's charity, when the planting of a seed is an act of conscientious objection. These are the times when maps fade, old landmarks crumble and direction is lost. Forwards is backwards now, so we glance sideways at the strange lands through which we are all passing, knowing for certain only that our destination has disappeared. We are unready to meet these times, but we proceed nonetheless, adapting as we wander, reshaping the Earth with every tread. Behind us we have left the old times, the standard times, the high times. Welcome to the irregular times.